upper east side bars 1980s
They were relatively small, rundown theaters; they tended to have a fair amount of drug use going on. At that time, Chelsea was unexplored territory. I was kind of tomboyish, but also pretty poor. In the summer of 1981 I was living with Gary Fisketjon, my best friend from college and my future editor at Random House. We recorded at a studio called Greene Street Recording Studio on Greene Street between Houston and Prince. Hip-hop artist Prince Whipper Whip of the hip-hop group Grand Wizard Theodore & the Fantastic Five at the Sparkle in the Bronx. We did a deep dive into the most avant-garde, atonal jazz. I was living with my parents in the Alfred E. Smith projects on the Lower East Sides waterfront. Hey, lets go get drunk at a bar.. An important place to have breakfast was Buffas, on the corner of Lafayette and Prince youd see Jim Jarmusch and Jonathan Demme in the booths there. The Mudd Club was one of my favorite spots to go out thats where I was introduced to James Chance and the Contortions and Talking Heads. Whether you were struggling, successful or just plain lucky, these stories remind us that in these years New York City dirty, dangerous, derelict, dazzling was the only place to be. Al Sharpton (right) backstage at Madison Square Garden on June 11, 1974. There was a theater called the Capri that I went to a lot. And Dynasty. Ive never gotten over Dynasty. And then people started dying. Soon there was an all-out war being waged for putting butts on barstools, and in these days before the internet, the bars would advertise their increasingly outrageous specials in the Village Voice and free local fliers sloppily stacked at the entrance to ATM banks, while hoping for write-ups in New York Magazines weekly goings-on section. I could wake up in the middle of the night and hear his typewriter going. Hed walk in and be perfectly comfortable with the Duke of Edinburgh. Upper East Side Bars - Directory of the Best Bars on the UES He was in his preppy stage in those days, wearing button-downs, which really is hard to imagine now. 1. Drunk patrons would dance on the bar top, well before Coyote Ugly, which would open in January of 1993, had popularized such shenanigans. Despite the lack of a cabaret license, DJ Mike would spin soon-to-be-classics of the moment like Salt-N-Pepas Lets Talk About Sex and Color Me Badds I Wanna Sex You Up, while everyone danced. It was a kind of a monks cell. The painter David Salle in his Manhattan studio, 1983. I had to be at the theater by 7 oclock so I could start my process and get ready before half-hour call. You wanted to be there when it was happening, and then youd migrate at around 2:30 to an after-hours club. (212) 861-2290. The Mudd Club was right around the corner, going full throttle. It was all happening at the same time; there was a lot of yin and yang. Pizza with Duck Sausage wins quick stardom. When I first moved to the city, there was a garbage strike. I tended to feel particularly safe in the theaters. Bars & Clubs Gay Bars. There were very few places to work out back then. Then we hit the clubs: Sound Factory, the Roxy, the Fun House. I made a deal for him to do a cheapo job by trading a Brice Marden plus $10,000. The deal with him was he never had to come and he never had to give any money, but he would give his name and a recommendation. Since no ones making them, they dont.. Every parent, every grown-up was your mother and father. My contemporary, the writer Ed [Edmund] White, had the apartment next door. It's just happening. Best 30 80s Night Clubs in New York City, NY with Reviews - Yellow Pages Theyd say, Yo, Dap, listen to that. All the hip-hop artists came [to the atelier]; there wasnt any other place that catered to rappers. Hear Rosie Perez talk about her first time at CBGB: Six days a week I arrived every morning between 7:30 a.m. and 8 a.m. We had a bar and some makeshift situation where people would collect the door charge, $5 or $10 maybe. My first loss was my partner, around the time Grace Kelly died in 1982. Everyone was very excited. Kyle: It has a window with LED lights around it, and a tourist was in the window and seemed to be making a humping motion. These places were used largely by working-class men, white, black and Latino, people who thought of themselves as straight and gay, many of whom were amenable to sexual things. Sometimes it was just me and my sister walking up to the velvet rope or the bouncers, or it would be a group of us, and they would let us right in. We always had coke, and many guests brought their own. I said, To hell with it! Jasmine Guy auditioned; she wasnt of age yet. 15 of the Best Upper East Side Bars to Visit Now - Time Out New York 25 East 61st street is the rear extension of 673 Madison Avenue, an Italianate brownstone built in 1871 by architect John G. Prague as part of a project for the developer John McCool which included a row of 5 brownstones on Madison Avenue, and 17 houses on 61st street. A chance encounter with David Bowie at a downtown nightclub. This was the scene at 2 a.m. on a Friday night in the spring of 1983 when my lover (as we called ourselves then), the film director Howard Brookner, and I threw the first of our preposterous Ladies Parties. And right away we see David Bowie, wearing a suit and sitting completely by himself in one of the hottest new clubs in the city. Elaine's - Wikipedia She and Larry Gagosian had this space, it was a condo loft in a building on West Broadway. Jimmy Carters reputation was tarnished by the hostage crisis in Iran, and I feared that perhaps Norman Mailer, an Elaines regular, or some very politically active and argumentative individual, might stop by our table to express some unfavorable comments. I was very attached to the Madison Avenue Bookshop, because of my Harvard connection to its owner, Arthur Lehman Loeb, and its excellence. The loft was across the street from Castelli [Gallery]. Otherwise neighborhood wasnt as important as finding a space one guy I knew, the photographer Patrick McMullan, lived in the coat-check room of a former hotel. His show was on at 1 a.m., after Johnny Carson. My apartment was four stories up, and I got a place on the floor below for Kim Gordon. Peter was straight out of Damon Runyon and Weegee. By 1968, there were a whopping 85 bars on the Upper East Side, most of them singles bars. I lived and still live in a large duplex at the corner of Park Avenue and 80th Street, in a 1907 building designed by Delano and Aldrich. Mom says that your apartment looks like a crack den, my daughter told me once. It wasnt actually the best place to hear or see bands, but it was always exciting. I was living with my aunt and one of my cousins in a shotgun apartment in Bushwick, Brooklyn. They were on 51st or 52nd between Fifth and Madison. In those days, there wasnt any downtown, so life was much easier. When me and Run would go to each others houses and rap together, we would go into the attic. Kim Gordon and Thurston Moore of Sonic Youth performing at CBGB in 1983. He claims the resort-area locals didnt know what to do with him when he began offering the same all-you-can-drink, ladies night-type deals. Photo by James & Karla Murray from their book NEW YORK NIGHTS After its appearance in Woody Allen's 1984 film, Broadway Danny Rose , Carnegie Deli became a classic. I was living uptown really the classic uptown, which, because I was young, seemed a little wild to some people with my kids and my mother (also, at that time I was in love with a Brazilian man Id met in Bali). Mozart. It was social, the Upper East Side ladies. And when my mother asked me where I was at, I just said, Oh, I was in the attic.. Top 10 Bars & Clubs in Upper East Side (New York City) - Tripadvisor It was very close to the Forward Building, which housed the important Yiddish newspaper. Sep 13, 2019 - Restaurants that I ate at as a child..most no longer exist. By 1968, 85 bars called the neighborhood home, like Gleason's, slightly further uptown near Yorkville, and similarly decorated to Friday's, with Tiffany lamps and the ornate wooden bar that had graced the Schaefer Beer pavilion at the 1964 World's Fair. 68. [1] Being at the Carlyle was amazing, but I was still an undergrad at Yale at the time, and the whole thing felt unreal, as though I was living two lives. In the mornings, usually around 11 a.m., Id go to one of the coffee shops around the corner on Avenue A. Odessa was one, and Leshkos was the other. As a subscriber, you have 10 gift articles to give each month. The original flier for Kellys show at the Pyramid Club in 1981. Spankys, a sports bar on 75th Street, attracted the young Republican crowd that had begun to invade the area. Thurston Moore would take me to see hardcore groups like Black Flag. Rich New York in the late 90s | Vanity Fair In retrospect, Bowie was ahead of the curve. I suppose I should have loved New York; things were very good for me. People would drop change in your hands, turn their heads when you tried to kiss them. But as soon as we walked in, nearly everyone stood and applauded. Not only did Mr. Brown come on with me, but Muhammad Ali did, too. I was working at the Whitney and helping to open different museum branches, so I was shuttling between 42nd Street, Stamford, Conn., and the downtown branch, which was just a few blocks from where I lived, on Front Street in the South Street Seaport area. I was also a regular at this neighborhood salon presided over by a Mr. Steve, who wore big, Coke-bottle thick glasses and was practically blind. Then you would call at 10, or 10 after, to check in with your agent to see if there was anything going that day. It was an incredible contrast from the last time I had lived in New York, when I was 17, during the summer of 1981, in a $500-a-month sublet loft that my boyfriend and I had found paging through our bible, the call to another life The Village Voice in his basement in Evanston. It was [at the Pyramid Club] just one night, October of 1982, before the floodgates opened. The sidewalks along St. Marks over to Astor Place were just as lively they were a sort of souk where you could buy back what the junkies had stolen from your apartment. Although it didn't hold up against Chili's, TGI Fridays, and Applebee's, there was a time when it was fairly ubiquitous throughout the states. And yet, plenty of ladies were also against them. Or I would throw a party. I was always worried about getting a dirty shirt or chipping a tooth., Ski Bars biggest attraction was the Slalom Shot, a four-foot-long slab of ice with a twisting trail cut into it. There's always a striking contrast to what it was and what it is now. A cracked bathroom mirror reflecting a sink full of discarded puffs, eyeliner brushes and trays of blush. Back then no one came in and said, Let me see your bar menu, says Block. How the Original TGI Fridays Helped Create the Singles Bar - InsideHook Wendy Wild made magic mushroom punch. This bar, deep inside the St. Regis on Fifth Avenue, is one of the few New York hotel bars whose . Upper East Side. I decided to start a music fanzine around 82; I called it Killer. When Todd wasnt looking, Id be running off copies and stapling them together. It was totally improvised, like a live prayer: Do you know that people are dying?, What Happened in New York Between 1981 and 1983, The Artists Who Brought Asian-Americans Into the Annals of Contemporary Art, 5 New York Times Writers on What They Got Right and Wrong in the Early 80s, What New York Was Like in the Early 80s Hour by Hour, https://www.nytimes.com/2018/04/17/t-magazine/24-hours-new-york-city-1980s-life.html. We went from our home in the East 60s, with Jimmy Carter and me in one car (driven by a member of the Secret Service) and Nan and Rosalynn in another. James Brown and Ali because of them, I basically became a made guy. They were all drunk and wasted and they were happy. It all depended on who was playing. The 10 Best Bars On The Upper East Side - Culture Trip In the Early 80s, It Made All the Difference, Oral History: Remembering New Yorks Fiorucci Store, New Yorkers and Their 80s Routines Block by Block, https://www.nytimes.com/2018/04/17/t-magazine/80s-nyc-map.html, Ann Magnuson, actress and performance artist. The idea of hip-hop hadnt really gelled. It was a brilliantly sunny day, and standing outside was Dustin Hoffman. They were more McDermotts friends, because my friends were working in fashion and they were like, Oh, get a job, bitch! She was the ultimate ballerina, and she became that on Fame. I was excited that I would be able to introduce this new band of gypsies to the Hollywood scene. He said, Dap, whats she doing? I said, Shes gasping for air now! And I go attend to her. They were very basic but super interesting. People would bring me their videos to pop in. The conversation was very interesting. I loved to walk down Clinton to Delancey I called it Rue de Rves because it was filled with bridal shops with garishly colored dresses. He goes, What the hell are you doing to my theater? I would get some bus money, some pizza money, some soda money and some money to be able to get into a jam. At night, if you headed south through long dark blocks to the meatpacking district, there were clubs and leather bars. But, most women slugging free beers at Brother Jimmys or complimentary Champagne at Jungle Jims or on-the-house Slalom Shots at Ski Bar arguably enjoyed these ladies night deals. We also created a percussive orchestra that was all pots and pans and a lot of racket, and that was the debut of the band Pulsallama. Peter lived on the absolute margins he never had anything. State records are incomplete. In the lot there are three vehicles. Guerrilla art activities took place all over. It was all exposed wood and brick, and it had a tiny fireplace, a futon, my books, a sink and a stove. Mornings spent alone, writing in a studio in the West Village. (I might be the only person who never lived in a scary New York apartment. My first photo lab was called Hy Photo. They were spinning on their heads, the cops said. I would go to school, come home, clean the house, babysit my second and third cousins, hang out on the stoop, wait for my aunt to come home, have dinner with her and wait until she fell asleep then I broke out. The bakery, located in the front and open 8 a.m. to 9 p.m., is great for an excellent croissant and coffee break. By the time midnight came around and I knew my parents were sleeping, I would sneak out the window down onto the porch. In 1980, I was working as a staff photographer for the New York Post. Some of them were open 24 hours a day, or they were closed maybe four hours a day for cleaning. In 80, I got a job at Todds Copy on Mott Street. It was a real neighborhood place, with people dropping in and hanging out, and a sort of day care center for neighbors who wanted us to watch their kids. It changed everything. One day, I was walking uptown to an appointment just before noon, and coming toward me was Robert Duvall. Within 18 months, several more "singles bars" were opened on 1st Avenue. If you just wanted to grab a sandwich, youd go to Burger Heaven. It was sort of 11 to 7. Its until you pass out.. Load more. And the rest of us were kinda like, Oh man, what? We were outside the Mine Shaft [a raunchy 1970s/'80s gay sex club on Washington Street]. Youd walk in there and all the actors would be sitting around, it was almost like a club, and youd see all these people: Danny Aiello, Warren Beatty. Everything had my initials on it, or the name of somebody else on it; it was really crazy. I did not know what my passions or imagination would lead to. Clear all filters. The apartment had this old refrigerator that didnt have room for much, so in the winter Id keep everything out on the fire escape. The Club Kids, led by impresario Michael Alig, turned places like the Limelight into backdrops of drug- and techno-induced drama, while live music dens like the Village Gate presented stages to. There were problems, of course; you serve young men and women as much alcohol as they can humanly consume and theres bound to be. The venues didn't matter to me. We were very, very thin. I never saw that before and hed never experienced that. The landlord turned off the plumbing, so wed defecate into garbage bags and throw them out the window. Sometimes you would want to go to a Police concert, but you wouldnt want to tell your friends, because they would be, like, Thats so commercial and gross. When it was the Dead Kennedys, Ari Up, The Slits, Public Image Ltd, you were all in full agreement. 2. I was straight-edge, so if I snuck out, I was all right, because I wasnt hungover the next day like the other kids. Thats where youd run into people, share breakfast. In the 60s, it was only open to the high class and the rich, like authors up on the Upper East Side. Live Psychic on East 84th offered free drinks and $10 tarot card readings from, yes, live psychics on a platform to the left of the dance floor, while single ladies shimmied to songs like Right Said Freds Im Too Sexy. While American Trash, a biker-themed bar, had literal garbage on the walls and ceiling. People divided themselves into camps based on which one they favored I liked Odessa better, but Id go to both. The whole neighborhood was a lower-middle class suburban area. This scrappy 16mm movie that people werent sure if it was a story movie or a documentary, everybody looked at it and said, I know that guy! They werent public figures; they were locally known graffiti artists, break-dancers, hip-hop M.C.s or D.J.s. AIDS was a very strange situation; starting in 82 you knew very little about it, and then a few years later you suddenly realized it was the largest killer among your personal friends. We had a studio on Bleecker near Seventh Avenue. And they were there illegally. Initially, owner Klay Reynolds had allowed ladies to drink whatever they desired; then he went through more Baileys Irish Cream in the first month he offered the deal than he would have expected to go through for all of 1991. In 1981, I lived on 79th and West End; it was tiny but very comfortable. There is no limit to it. I was part of the backpacker renaissance; you brought a backpack, so youd have a change of clothes. We were both rather exotic in each others eyes. Wed been working on the film for a year in dribs and drabs. In the 1980s, the restaurant began to decline, as it switched up menu items in favor of more chicken and fish. Maxi Cohen, Area, 1985, Ladies Rooms Around The World, Courtesy of Ai Weiwei Studio and Chambers Fine Art. Jumbo-sized martini glasses smeared with ruby lipstick. My fantasy was to rent one of these theaters on 42nd Street and show my movie alongside Mad Monkey Kung Fu. You could be a young person in Manhattan back then, Block recalls. Wed go: Look, even if you dont know how to strip wood, were gonna show you: This gooey mess that you have to brush on the wood, wait till it bubbles, then you scrape it off. Most mornings, we would wake up and check the answering machine. Were shooting one of the final scenes in Smithereens where the main character, Paul, talks to a hooker in his graffiti-covered van the film was very influenced by the graffiti art and punk scene of that time, particularly on the Lower East Side. I made a short performance called Life Without Grace, a kind of eulogy. Answer (1 of 6): While not classy in haute cuisine, these long-gone restaurants were very popular in the 70s and 80s too: * The Caramba! There was always someone between apartments or someone coming to town who needed somewhere to stay. If I were going out that night, Id go see Garren to fix my hair. The artist David McDermott shot by his then-partner, the artist Peter McGough, East Village, 1983. Growing up in the suburbs of Chicago, a boy like me didnt know there was a place for him in the world like that. (And Ski Bar even opened a Ski Bar 2 pop-up at Hunter Mountain during the winter. There was an interest beyond becoming ladies who lunch. Everyone talks about the 1970s as being the birth of feminism, but for me, the 80s were really about feminism in practical use. The night was such a hoot we tried to reprise it a few times, but the tenor slid from hilarity to melodrama, and, like so many ecstasies of the era, soon just crumbled and fell apart. Cramped beer and shot joints with names like the Blue Moon, Czar Bar, and Richters were all vying for the attention of this influx of recently graduated young adults who wanted to go out, but had little money to do so. It was in this desolate area between TriBeCa and Chinatown, and I knew every alley. Hearing hip-hop on the street, minimalist new music, free jazz it all added to this fabric that was a landscape. By ajordahl123. These parties inevitably blur together in my mind, but I remember that night because a week later, Abbott stabbed and killed a waiter at the Binibon cafe, a few doors down the block. Dinner on the Upper East Side with a former president of the United States. Book with OpenTable. And then off wed go! Bars would battle to get people in the doors., Then a bar on First Avenue, Far Out Lounge, came up with a gimmick that would change everything, with the ultimate idea to draw in the skirts that bring in the suits.. There was a studio near First Avenue in the 50s that used a dance technique that was a modified version of Pilates. Best Upper East Side bars in NYC. David McDermott and Peter McGough, artists. The gallery space was on the first floor; our offices were in the basement. It was still a sort of wild west that far uptown, and the facility was quickly dubbed Dormandie Court for the raucous, college-like atmosphere it had created and then fostered. I remember the smell of the theaters so well popcorn and weed.
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